#queer media analysis

[scissorsaint]

which reanimator did you all watch?

[cranberrylimes]

Fight Club is queer media and anyone who argues against this is just factually wrong.

I understand that some people don't want to label media as queer unless it has characters that are explicitly stated to be gay, but that's just not how media works.

Queer media doesn't mean "media that has queer people in it". Although I can see where the misunderstanding comes from.

It's not always about representing people in the LGBTQ+ community positively. A lot of the time, queer media is more about the creators and target audience, more so than the romantic relationships of the characters.

The characters themselves don't need to know they're gay or even have any concept of what it means to be queer within the context of their story.

This is how we end up with queer coded characters, whose stories aren't centred around their romantic/sexual relationships, but they're used as a narrative device in the story to express a certain idea about the queer experience.

And that experience could be anything! Like religion, friendship, discrimination, loneliness, euphoria, repression, coming of age, romance, etc. The only important part is that it is expressed through the context of the queer experience.

Fight Club is about a lot of things. For one, it's about losing your identity as an individual within consumerist culture, and a scathing critique of toxic masculinity. AND it's queer media!

So don't listen to people who say shit like "it's not that deep" or bullshit about "the gay agenda" because they're wrong. All it takes is a little media literacy to understand that queer stories are everywhere if you know how to see them. You are seen and loved. And your experiences are represented by people that understand.

[everyforkedroad]

Why Shine Feels "Incomplete" to Some Fans and Why That’s the Point

Soon after the last episode of Shine ended, the fandom space on X erupted in dissatisfaction that quickly turned into anger, especially with respect to Trin's character arc and the Tanwa/Trin romance arc.

Although the showrunners consistently described Shine as a gay series, many fans accused BOC of exploiting MileApo’s BL fame and using familiar marketing tactics to lure BL audiences, only to deliver something that refused to play by BL rules. That tension between promise and expectation sits at the heart of this entire backlash.

A translator’s thoughtful thread about Shine’s artistic choices was met with anger and mockery, and soon the show’s writers, translators, and even production staff became targets of harassment. What began as a conversation about interpretation turned into a campaign of bullying. Watching that unfold has been disheartening, especially because the translator’s words revealed something vital about Shine’s artistic intent that many people refused to hear.

I’ve been thinking a lot about why that reaction feels so strong and why it also completely misses what makes this series so special.

To me, the backlash around Shine isn’t just about one ending. It’s about two different ways of understanding queer storytelling.

Heteronormative storytelling norms, especially in romance and BL genres, are the kind we’ve all been trained to expect. It demands that characters grow, fall in love, overcome obstacles, and end with closure in a very specific way. Even when the story is queer, we’re often measuring it by straight narrative rules: does it give us a happy ending? Is the arc complete?

But queer storytelling doesn’t always work that way. Sometimes it resists neat arcs. It lingers in tension, ambiguity, and longing. It values imagery, atmosphere, and emotional truth more than tidy resolution.

That’s what Shine does. It refuses to flatten itself into a BL fantasy. Trin’s story isn’t unfinished. His journey doesn’t follow a straight (literally and narratively) line from problem to solution. He embodies what the translator called queer aesthetics, which means he exists outside the usual rules of narrative progress. It is ambiguous, and so much of it takes place away from the eyes of viewers.

A lot of people are angry because they expected a BL ending: clear closure, emotional payoff, and fan-service catharsis. When they didn’t get that, they called it bad writing. But it’s not bad writing; it's a different kind of art that lives and breathes outside of heteronormative rules.

Shine was never a fan-service series. It’s political, layered, and deliberately queer. Its creators valued message and vision over meeting fandom demands. That’s not arrogance. That’s courage.

When audiences call that refusal flawed, what they’re really saying is, “I only recognize queerness when it behaves like heterosexual romance.” That’s the tragedy of the backlash; it turns queer resistance into an error.

The truth is that queer art often ends in deferral. Closure sometimes happens outside the frame, in the moments the story leaves us to imagine; in this case, between a kiss on the Pont Neuf and a long life of committed love. The ambiguity is in the story; the discomfort is in us. Shine refuses to explain itself, and that refusal unsettles audiences who have learned to measure queer stories by how neatly they resemble straight ones.

[sourtimesmachine]

Article Masterlist - Supernatural

Collection of my pieces breaking down the Supernatural finale, its context, and its aftermath.

Reference thread link

"This is about stories, and the intricate ways in which they become part of us and our world– the ways our lives and struggles are reflected, subverted, and reinforced."

Supernatural’s Legacy: The Trauma of Silence

Understanding the unique grief of Supernatural fans, and the power of stories to liberate and to punish. [Warning: spoilers for season fifte

"At the end of Supernatural, the same institutions and cultural powers that have always suppressed stories and voices were still waiting on the other side of the screen. Our gods had not been defeated."

The TV Gods Are Watching: Why Supernatural’s Metanarrative Matters

The importance of how stories are told and who gets to tell them. [Warning: Spoilers for season fifteen of Supernatural.]

"Supernatural was not building toward a tragic end, it was actively commenting on the ultimate uselessness and sin of demanding tragedy in a story about love, self-acceptance, and truth."

Supernatural and the Trap of Queer Tragedy

Reflecting on queer storytelling, representation, and the cost of a failed escape.

"If Supernatural is about the denial of self and breaking cycles of manipulation, anger, and retribution through the truth, our experience in its aftermath has been about what we do when that truth gets fed back into the cycle."

It’s Something I Know I Can’t Have: Supernatural and the Truth

When stories can’t move on from us.

"In Supernatural, the characters got to be real, if just for a moment, and it was this moment of being that revealed how the story would fail without the having. No matter what came after, that is why we are still here."

Spirals All the Way Down: Anxiety and Supernatural’s Queer Paradox

It’s been five years, and here I find myself again. Dwelling on the end of Supernatural.

Bonus:

"Rather than avoiding the narrative burden of Dean’s death and all the circumstances, both in story and out, that led us to it, The Winchesters is breaking it down. It is examining each theme that was regressed by the finale and pointedly reaffirming it. It’s telling us that what happened to Dean was wrong, that there is something to be done about."

The Winchesters: Misdirecting the Cycle

What Supernatural's prequel tells us about healing, trauma, and beginning new endings. [Spoilers for The Winchesters and Supernatural]

[mrsdaphnefielding]

Thinking through Mafin, ep 375+, in terms of structure, dramaturgy and narrative.

While this exit scenario means a lot more heartbreak than “let’s send Fina away on a photography apprenticeship”, I think it is actually a very good decision towards maintaining Mafin as (possible) endgame.

On a structural level, Fina’s exit (temporary or not) is a necessity due to Brunet’s personal situation. I don’t move on X any longer (a decision of not wanting to create revenue for someone who uses his money to actively lobby against queer people – but I am privileged in that I don’t depend on X for professional networking), so I am not as well-informed whether Brunet has already confirmed her return.

So I guess she has not, which would be a sound choice on her part – she is at an age where there (still) might be other work offers, more compatible with raising a family, but even if (if!) she left, it wouldn’t rule out a Mafin endgame. You don’t need more than a good writers’ room, some dialog lines across the last 20 eps of the show, and a final frame of Marta boarding a plane to Buenos Aires in breathless anticipation to do that. Possibly, a one-time guest stint of for Brunet/Fina waiting at the airport? (not what I would prefer to see in terms of airtime, but it would leave the storyline intact, and that matters the most in terms of narrative patterns and representation and not belittling this storyline as exchangeable).

Also, structurally: this is a hit show (Spain’s most watched, this past year?). They will try to keep this running to the max, as long as it drags in the money and the accolades. „Amar en tiempos revueltos“, as the direct predecessor, ran for 19 (!) years, and SdL seems to be even bigger in terms of impact. It would be logical to have many core cast changes but maintain the narrative frame. Cast changes will depend on narrative arcs, other role offers and life decisions (daytime schedules are grueling). But offers, again, also depend not just on the quality of someone’s work, but on the ageism and sexism of the industry.

How do you deal with that, dramaturgically, and what could that mean in terms of Mafin?

Soaps live off drama, as a genre, and that means you need to keep your characters as open in terms of possibilities as you can. E.g. having Marta continue as the show’s female lead sans Fina and without further romance plots, for years, is not a sound decision in terms of show dramaturgy and show economy because it reduces drama options. So Belmonte staying on long-term (but Brunet not) would likely mean new romance plots, but those could still be integrated into an endgame arc (one of you (@bloomsberries, I think? Also @roadien60?) pointed out how they use that at the moment for Begoña and Andrés), depending on the care the producers are willing to invest there. Given the large international traction and possible syndication linked to it, chances are not that bad since they can be economically reasoned. Additionally, the show is big enough to have either community members in that writing room, or at least extensive expert consultation, and it shows (I find) – as seen in their reversal of “Bury Your Gays”.  

Dramaturgically, what the writing room is doing (or has been doing, months ago) is preserving maximum possibility and, so far, I find it done with care for the Mafin storyline.

Narratively, the only way to make Fina leave – and she protests leaving in both ep. 376 and ep. 377, saying that Marta does not want to be without her, that she does not want to leave without Marta – is to make Fina believe that she is protecting Marta by that; and, more so, that not telling Marta and giving her up will ultimately save and protect Marta.

Fina is already feeling like a murderer (and I think they play this up also to position her morally, to counteract the historical trope of gays being morally depraved by default). She knows she cannot stay, with Pelayo’s threats; Pelayo will likely push her into accepting that she cannot drag Marta down by being in a relationship with a murderer, and doesn’t she want Marta happy, longterm, even if it means without Fina? (Another question is whether Fina will accept the Buenos Aires offer of Pelayo, or whether – which I find more plausible, from how the character is drawn morally – she will reject it and simply run: yet more narrative openness there.)

Back to dramaturgy for a moment: if they sent Fina off on a photography apprenticeship and the producing team would have to line up another romance plot for Marta as the show’s female lead (next to Begoña), that would be, narratively, Marta choosing someone else. Whereas with Marta not knowing, with having to fear Fina has left her, perhaps assuming Fina dead, Marta, uncertain and heartbroken, is in a place where any in-between romance – should it come to that – could be easily overcome in terms of narrative by the „true love comes back to town“ trope. It’s not what I would prefer for this character, who – as @nerdishpursuits has argued excellently yesterday – is positioned as the great romantic heroine, but this is a point where narrative and soap dramaturgy/genre demands would clash.

So the crux, for me, will be how the narrative serves up a credible explanation for Fina leaving, without damaging the Marta/Fina endgame romance plot (to abandon this level of epic setup would be a shame), while being mindful of the demands of daytime TV in terms of dramaturgy and structure. And Fina not telling Marta might build towards that, actually. There could be a lost letter or note involved, of course (one of you mentioned that option, I cannot find it again right now. Was it a reply comment?), something Fina meant to reach Marta, and then it doesn’t?

Difficulties are, narratively, that 1) Marta and Fina are at a point where they are very close and good with communication, and 2) where both are confident enough in their lives to demand their share of happiness (I LOVED Fina not caving in and holding her own against Pelayo in ep 376!), and that 3) Fina wouldn’t leave Marta behind in the hands of a man who, fine, wouldn’t hurt her because he needs her, but who is evil. So I am very curious to see how they will address that, and how much time they have had to come up with a solution that is narratively satisfying and true to their romance plot.

That said, the writers’ room is doing a lot of things right (as mentioned yesterday), in explicitly positioning the lesbians as morally sound – any shadiness Marta is dealing with is due to class privilege, not her sexuality – as the positive heroines of the storyline, and as victims of structural discrimination. They made sure Fina is not shown as consciously killing someone (Santiago fell on his knife while he strangled her), and they are now even giving the lesbians the Grand Romeo & Juliet Tomb Scene, as Juliet & Juliet In A Bed, and it’s not set up as tokenist/gratifying for a male gaze, from the preview.

And while their being gay is an aspect of their characters, that, yes, impacts their lives (=living in constant fear of being discovered, being unable to rely on state judicative due to that), it is neither all that they are, nor is it something put on and then thrown away again at the drop of a hat.

And from my perspective of some 30 years of watching and analyzing queer media, it is such a gift, and such huge progress, to have lesbian characters taken seriously as lesbian characters, to have them be gay, and stay gay. And not be killed for it, and not be treated as expendable or lesser or laughing stock. To have them neither (dis)played solely for ratings, nor desexualized (some remaining double standards notwithstanding). And, in this case, to have a lesbian storyline be one of the core romance arcs that underline an entire show narrative? Unparalleled.

In my impression, the crew are very aware of what they have created, and they’re taking care of it best as they can, given the constraints of the industry (also, capitalism).

(Am I negotiating my own storyline anxieties by writing all this up? You bet. But then, that’s another marvelous thing – about the genre, and about fandom: that it makes people come together, to squeal and fret and theorize. And in our case, also to amplify, analyze, and acknowledge queer representation. Because in the end, it’s stories like this one who give a society narrative patterns of how to think about queer lives, and those are the lives we live out there, every day.)

[strawberrythighddemon]

The Summer Hikaru Died Doesn’t Need a BL Label to Be Queer Horror | A Jennifer’s Body Comparison

The Summer Hikaru Died is an anime on Netflix that immediately caught my attention. The trailer clips drew me in with their unsettling horror — the idea of another entity occupying a human body, which often symbolizes how trauma transforms us into something unrecognizable. It reminded me of another cult classic that explores similar themes through sapphic undertones, girlhood, and friendship: Jennifer’s Body.

Years ago, I wrote blogs about how Jennifer’s Body portrays the experience of girls loving each other within a hetero-normative society. Horror has always been a deeply queer genre, no matter what people assume. Carmilla — the vampire story that inspired Bram Stoker and Anne Rice — used horror to explore hidden sapphic relationships within society. The exchange of blood and biting became metaphors for intimacy and desire, though depending on context, those same acts could represent violence or violation.

Post by @strawberrythighddemon · 22 images

💬 0  🔁 2  ❤️ 0 · I resonated with Jennifer, so I'll defend her (Jennifer's Body: 2009)... · Bear with me on this blog... I'm adding some li

Post by @strawberrythighddemon · 19 images

💬 0  🔁 7  ❤️ 9 · The difference between mainstream success and an evolving cult classic... · What's the difference between these two distinc

Like Carmilla, The Summer Hikaru Died doesn’t need to be labeled BL or Yaoi to be queer. It simply is. While BL/Yaoi or Yuri/GL tags often focus on romantic or sexual relationships, The Summer Hikaru Died builds its narrative around emotional intimacy and transformation rather than overt romance. The same can be said for Jennifer’s Body — both works use horror to express closeness and identity through tension, embodiment, and change.

Through physical actions and chosen words, both stories reveal intimacy and even pleasure in ways that differ from traditional depictions. For example, the dynamic between Hikaru and Yoshiki mirrors the complex bond between Jennifer and Needy — love and fear intertwined, identity and desire blurred.

With the anime The Summer Hikaru Died, it doesn’t need to be labeled as BL or Yaoi for it to be queer — it simply is. Typically, BL/Yaoi or Yuri/GL tags are used for stories centered on romance or sexual experiences between characters. The narrative in those genres often builds around the characters coming together romantically or sexually. But that was never the core theme in The Summer Hikaru Died or Jennifer’s Body. What both share instead is intimacy — expressed through physical actions, emotional closeness, and dialogue that carries weight beyond surface meaning.

In The Summer Hikaru Died, intimacy and even pleasure are portrayed differently from standard depictions. One striking example occurs between Hikaru and Yoshiki. Yoshiki, the main character and Hikaru’s best friend, mirrors Needy from Jennifer’s Body, while Hikaru parallels Jennifer. Hikaru, no longer human and now inhabited by a yokai that devours spirits, allows Yoshiki to place his hand inside the slit in his chest — a part of his body that functions as a mouth for consuming spirits.

The scene evokes a sense of vulnerability and trust rather than horror. Yoshiki’s initial hesitation isn’t disgust but curiosity — a careful exploration of something unfamiliar, almost tender. The act becomes symbolic of intimacy: testing boundaries, learning how closeness feels, and moving gently rather than forcefully. Hikaru’s calm acceptance deepens that symbolism, transforming what could be grotesque into something emotionally charged and strangely beautiful.

They repeat this act more than once, often in secluded spaces like a maintenance closet — places that echo the hidden moments of intimacy people steal with those they care about. Yet, because the series isn’t framed as a love story, these details can easily be overlooked or dismissed. Still, they reveal how horror can express connection and desire in ways that defy conventional romantic storytelling.

Just like in Jennifer’s Body, it can be difficult for anyone unfamiliar with the queer experience to recognize that Jennifer is romantically interested in Needy — that she always chooses Needy as her safe space. Even after experiencing the most traumatic moment of her life, being stabbed to death by the band members of Low Shoulder (a metaphorical reference to sexual assault), Jennifer goes to Needy’s house first.

She doesn’t harm Needy. Instead, she’s careful, almost gentle around her. Even in their brief physical, sexual encounter, Jennifer gives Needy space to decide whether to pursue her. I’ve always argued that Jennifer never truly fights Needy. In the end, when Needy breaks the friendship necklace — the symbol of their bond — Jennifer’s resistance fades. That necklace was Jennifer’s heart, the embodiment of their connection. I read that scene as Jennifer allowing Needy to kill her because there was no reason to keep going. But not before leaving a mark — a bite that, like vampirism, represents intimacy and transformation. Jennifer leaves pieces of herself within Needy.

Jennifer’s Body isn’t labeled as romance or sapphic, even though the evidence is there. Jennifer openly says she “goes both ways,” reflected in the victims she chooses to consume. Her possessiveness toward Needy and jealousy when Needy shows interest in boys at school reveal her emotional attachment. Jennifer devours those boys not out of hunger alone, but because they divert Needy’s attention — something she couldn’t control when she was human. As a succubus, she gains the power to remove those distractions.

Some might call that narcissistic, but it’s worth asking why her focus is entirely on Needy. It’s because Needy gives her what she needs emotionally and mentally — something she doesn’t want from anyone else. That dynamic is toxic, yes, but it’s also deeply human. Jennifer isn’t allowed to express her feelings for Needy in a healthy way. She embodies the archetype of the “beautiful girl” who uses social capital to survive, exploiting men for what she wants. She’s never romantic with them, never emotionally invested — sex becomes a form of currency, an exchange. Jennifer understands that and uses it knowingly. But Needy is different. Needy is where she finds love.

When Yoshiki discovers what happened to Hikaru, the yokai inhabiting Hikaru’s body could easily have killed him — but doesn’t. The yokai carries Hikaru’s memories and feelings, which anchor it to Yoshiki. Still, it warns him not to tell anyone, saying something along the lines of, “Hate to kill you.” That moment reveals the yokai’s conflict: it doesn’t want to harm Yoshiki but instead wants to explore the deep connection that remains between them, a bond inherited from Hikaru himself.

That’s why the scene where the yokai allows Yoshiki to penetrate Hikaru’s body — hand through the chest slit — is so significant. It’s an act of consent, vulnerability, and curiosity. It blurs the line between horror and intimacy, showing how closeness can exist even in the most unsettling circumstances.

All in all, I recommend watching The Summer Hikaru Died and Jennifer’s Body and paying attention to those subtle details. Both are narratives worth devouring. Though they exist in different mediums — one anime, one film — they each explore queer intimacy through transformation and horror. Even if anime isn’t your usual genre, it’s worth experiencing both to see how they portray the nuances of queer love: men loving men, women loving women, and the shared emotional truths that connect them.

Take that as you will.

[summergoodwife]

Transfem headcanons are awesome, but ISTG some of you are like

"Bethica is transfem hear me out 😳 that salsa she likes is way too spicy for a real woman"

and sometimes the transfem reading of Bethica is juicy as fuck but now if I say any of the real reasons, I'll get grouped in with you braingeniuses

[belladonna413]

It was always strange to see James Somerton's videos, as he could jump from an astute and well-thought point to the wildest bad takes, so it did explain a lot to learn about his plagiarism and the extent of it. Yesterday, I had joked with some mutuals in the Good Omens fandom about the odds he just read Tumblr metas straight off his phone in his video "Neil Gaiman and the Queering of Fantasy." (I have not seen the video yet - I didn't care to see someone take such a bored tone when talking about media I am so passionate about.)

But the more I think about his plagiarism, the angrier I get. I am passionate about queer media analysis - growing up in an extremely conservative home, that media was the only community available to me. I realized just how upset I was at not being able to know the people he stole from, and to have a chance to properly appreciate their work.

Does anyone know whether people are compiling lists of the writers he has stolen from?

I'm trying to see if I can find any myself, and I will share whatever I am able to find.